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Fluffy, Fluffy Pancakes

These super fluffy pancakes are sure to be a showstopper at your next brunch party! This recipe is quick, easy, and doesn’t require any buttermilk!

Life is all about yummy fluffy pancakes.

Admit it, a world without pancakes would be bleak, maybe not even worth living in. You love pancakes, don’t you? You do. It’s okay, I do too. My favourite thing about pancakes (other than eating them, of course!) is watching maple syrup drip off the edges of my pancake tower, like some sort of sun-kissed waterfall.

Fluffy pancakes are one of my all-time favourite Sunday morning breakfast treats. The problem is that a lot of great pancake recipes call for buttermilk. (Honestly, who keeps buttermilk at home? Is that a North American thing?)

Without it, you can end up with a flat, lifeless pancake that looks too much like a lost crepe. Here’s a quick and easy recipe to make super fluffy pancakes with ingredients you probably already have at home. Never buy that horrid box of premix again. Please.

This is what moody pancakes look like.

Can you make Fluffy Pancakes without Buttermilk?

In short, yes. This pancake recipe uses no buttermilk at all (it does require regular milk though). So, you may ask, what’s the deal with buttermilk? Well, it’s terribly in vogue when it comes to baking. And there’s a reason for it. The acidity in buttermilk helps the pancakes rise.

On the flip side, I’ve never known anyone to regularly stock up on buttermilk. In fact, until I moved to Canada, I had never even seen buttermilk… not even at a supermarket!

(If you’re ever in a real pinch – you can create your own buttermilk alternative by mixing a cup of milk with a tablespoon of white vinegar and letting it sit for 10 minutes. Perhaps less conventionally, you could also use a tablespoon of fresh lemon juice instead of vinegar. Neither option tastes as good as the real thing, but they’ll do the trick. Thankfully, with this recipe – you won’t need to!)

Sifting flour is a beautiful thing. It’s like making snow fall… And then turning it into a cake.

Why are my pancakes flat? How can I make my pancakes fluffier?

There are a number of factors that can lead to your pancakes being flat. But here are the four horsemen of the pancake apocalypse (pancalypse…panpocalypse…pancakalypse…help):

Overmixing your batter – overmixing your pancake batter will deflate a lot of the air bubbles in your batter, making it difficult for your pancakes to rise into the light and fluffy pancakes you want (the video in my recipe section is an example of this!). Secondly, it’ll develop gluten. And too much gluten will result in a tough, chewy pancake.

Stale Baking Powder – baking powder typically has a shelf life of 9 months to a year. To check whether your baking powder is still fresh, simply stir half a teaspoon of baking powder into a cup of water. If you see an immediate reaction (it’ll fizz up, bestie!), then it’s still good to use. If not, you should consider replacing it.

Humid Conditions – This is based on an observation made by many of my readers (you can see it mentioned in the comments section below). But a very humid kitchen results in a runnier batter, which means less fluffy pancakes. If you happen to be in a place that is very humid, try putting your batter in the fridge for 10-15 minutes to make sure it doesn’t become too fluid/runny.

Not Letting Your Batter Rest – Letting your batter rest before cooking allows the starch granules in the flour to expand resulting in an airier pancake.

The Violent Flip – Turn the pancakes over gently. Flipping them high into the air results in the air literally being squished out of them!

Also…make sure to relax, bestie. Making pancakes should be a pleasurable experience! And this fluffy pancake recipe is simple; it doesn’t require any fancy steps (like whipping egg whites into a meringue). Be mindful of the tips above, and pay attention to your heat management, and you’re sure to be fine.

(If you want to do a little reading, check out my How to Read a Recipe Post – it’ll help you understand the procedures and the measurements used in a recipe post, like this one!)

Of course, if you do end up burning your first pancake, just remember what they say: “Le première crepe est pour les chiens!” (A French saying meaning, “The first crepe is for the dogs!”).

The faster you cook, the sooner you eat!

Other No-Buttermilk Pancake Recipes You Need to Check Out

Here are four other amazing pancake recipes that don’t require any buttermilk at all. Each one is unique, and delicious!

Fluffy Japanese Pancakes – taking a bite out of these meringue-based babies is like eating a delicious cloud! (Yes, they spark joy.)

Maple syrup over a pat of butter. Yes, please!

Fluffy Pancakes, Updated: What’s Changed?

If you’ve been visiting my blog for a while, you may realise that this is a republished version of one of my very early blog posts (also titled, “Fluffy, Fluffy Pancakes”, originally published: February 17th 2015). I’ve updated the post quite significantly.

While the recipe is the same great pancake recipe it’s always been, I’ve rewritten the post with the aims of addressing some of the major questions I’ve received from commenters over the last few years. If there’s anything you feel is still missing, please do let me know with a comment below.

I’ve also done my best to create a clearer, more readable post, while maintaining the gist and the feel of the original. (The original post was written quite some time back, it was mostly me rambling about how much I love pancakes!)

Helpful Tools

Heads up! The following are affiliate links. If you buy something through one of these links, I will receive a small commission. You won’t need to pay a penny more, but it’ll help keep my lights on! Thank you bestie, you rock!

Luckily, it doesn’t take much equipment to make perfect pancakes. It is however a lovely feeling to have all the right equipment. Here are a few little things that might make your pancake-making experience just that much sweeter.

OR…(and this is super exciting, bestie) how’s about you check out The Chocolates & Chai Shop? The shop is a place for fashionable foodies, providing all sorts of apparel including the popular Today for Tomorrow t-shirt (25% of the profits from it go to charity!).

Instructions

Combine flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder into a bowl and mix well.

In a separate bowl, mix the egg, milk, vanilla, and melted butter together. Be careful not to use hot, melted butter, as that may end up cooking your eggs!

Pour the wet ingredient mixture into the dry ingredients and stir till mostly incorporated. The batter should be thick and a little lumpy, but without any visible streaks of flour. If it is too thick to work with, add a little milk. Set the batter aside for 5-10 minutes.

Heat a heavy-bottomed, non-stick pan over a low-medium heat and coat it with oil. Use a 1/4 cup measure to scoop and drop the batter into the pan so that you get evenly-sized pancakes.

Cook until the first side is golden brown, or until the top surface forms bubbles. Flip and repeat on the other side. Adjust heat accordingly. Serve while still hot.

Hey Fahad! Thanks for commenting, I’m glad you enjoyed it! I think that’s actually an error from the recipe multiplication plugin/software that I’m using. I’ll drop the support team a note to let them know that happens, and hopefully they’ll fix it super quick. Thanks for letting me know!

Yes, that’s what I use for this recipe (though some other commenters have mentioned that they feel 3/4 cups is enough – some have speculated that kitchen humidity plays a part in this).

If you’re feeling super confident, you can add 3/4 cups, and see how that looks (but don’t start mixing otherwise you’ll almost definitely overmix if you need to add more), and add the additional 2 tbsp if necessary.

Turned out great and fluffy. I used cooking oil instead, but they still turned out great. I’ve also successfully halved the recipe a few times. I do have the problem sometimes of the second side turning out a bit undercooked (but not doughy).

I’m ready for experimenting! I’ve replaced the flour with corn flour, but the resulting batter/pancake was rather soupy/dense. I still enjoyed it though. Any suggestions for using corn flour?

I’ve used yogurt mixed with some water. The pancake was pleasingly sweeter, but the batter and resulting pancake were much thicker than normal, though still fluffy and yummy.

Finally, are there any good ideas for adding banana to the pancakes? I assume adding sliced banana into the pancake while it’s cooking? What about adding banana (or even mango/whatever fruit) puree into the mix? How would I need to adjust the ratios?

Hey Luke! Thanks so much for the awesome comment! Getting that heat to cook both sides perfectly can be a bit tricky, it’s something I’ve had to experience myself. But once you get it, there’s a lot of satisfaction to it! I’ve never tried it using corn flour so I’m afraid I don’t have much I can contribute on that.

I’ve not tried mixing in a puree, I would assume it would hurt the fluffiness due to the extra mixing required to combine it all. Another commenter mentioned adding a smashed banana and everything turning out fine. I’d personally go the route of caramelising the bananas separately, and using them as a topping. Let me know what you find out! Hope to hear back from you, bestie!

SO GOOD. My boyfriend and I made them this morning and added a smashed banana into it. Oh my god… the perfect crust to fluff ratio. Best damn pancakes I’ve ever made. (We topped them with nutella, blueberries, whipped cream, and maple syrup… it was a ‘treat yoself’ kinda morning.)

Hi there Sydney! I’m SO HAPPY to hear you and your boyfriend enjoyed it! Nutella, blueberries, whipped cream, and maple syrup…wow! Those are a bunch of my favourite toppings!! Hope you two make a few more of my recipes!

Hi! I loved this recipe! Yet, my pancakes turned out pretty chewy and thick, not very fluffy. What am I doing wrong? When is the egg beaten right and not over beaten? and are you supposed to mix the ingredients with force (handmixer) after combining them? Or just gently scoop them together until it becomes a mix? thank you!

Hi there! If you’re using a handmixer, you’re almost definitely going to overmix the batter. The mixing is a very delicate process, it’s really just a small number of folds with your spatula (thick, lumpy, with a few streaks of flour is perfect). Overmixing is very likely the reason your pancakes turn out chewy and thick (basically its a matter of overworking the gluten, and beating out the air)

As for the egg, it doesn’t need to be mixed to the point of fluffing up into a meringue like thing. But you don’t want any big gooey bits of the whites left intact (similar to how you would beat eggs for an omelette). Hope that helps, Raanya!

Hey Owen! Thank you for commenting!!! I’m so happy to hear you enjoyed the recipe AND that you found the instructions to be so helpful! This is one of those recipes where following the tips/tricks are just about as important as getting all the measurements right!

Amazing. Pancakes have always been my Achilles heel in the kitchen. I’m telling you, I could even ruin bisquick pancakes! This recipe changes all that. Perfect, fluffy, sweet, and easy to whip up. My four year old is obsessed!

I woke up this morning really craving pancakes. But I never have any buttermilk. So I made this recipe and it was amazing. I’ve been looking for a good pancake recipe. I will use this recipe everytime i crave pancakes. Thank you!

The directive to add 2 tablespoons of milk to the 3/4 cup of milk might be a result of converting the unit of measurement. I’ve noticed this happen when a recipe from the UK or Australia is converted from measurements in volume in milliliters to volume in cups or ounces for American readers.

Hey Nina! The reason I say to add 2 tbsp of milk to the 3/4 cup is because 7/8th cups don’t readily exist! So adding 2tbsp (which is 1/8th of a cup of milk) to 3/4cups is the simplest way to go 🙂 Hope that helps!

I have a flaw when it comes to cooking, and about which my family teases me on a regular basis: I can never 100% follow a recipe, and this one was no exception! It looked amazing, I loved the photos of those fluffy pancakes and was drooling over the prospect of making them; however, I also try to make things a touch healthier or whole grain so consequently I made a few changes. First off, I doubled the recipe (I freeze pancakes to have for breakfast or a snack). Then, I soaked 1 cup of whole oats in milk overnight and just used one cup of flour (instead of two, since I doubled the recipe). Then, actually, I used a scant cup of flour because I also put in about three heaping tablespoons of ground flax (plus a little extra milk) and finally, added in some home dried blueberries. Oh my word – amazing! I realize these changes may not be for everyone, but for me – fabulous. Thanks for a great “base” recipe!!!

Hi Linda, I’m sorry to hear your pancakes didn’t turn out fluffy! I’m not sure where things went wrong, but I’d recommend going through the Why Are My Pancakes Flat section above and seeing if any of that applies.

I’m a fairly accomplished cook, but these didn’t work at all. I checked my baking powder, followed the recipe exactly, but my batter was thin and the pancakes came out almost like crepes. Made a second batch thinking I must have done something wrong. Same results. I don’t think cutting the 2 T of milk will be enough to make a significant difference. My hubby loves fluffy pancakes. I’m so frustrated!

I’m sorry to hear this! I’m not sure what the reason could…do you have a particularly humid kitchen (in which case you may need to refrigerate your batter for a bit)? Alternatively, overmixing the batter is where I’ve slipped up the most (it’s surprisingly easy to do). Hope that helps!

Hi there! You can remove the vanilla extract (it won’t impact the texture/fluffiness of the pancakes), however the flavour will be slightly plain without it. You can mask this with lots of maple syrup!

My grands wanted pancakes this morning and I had run out of mix. My granddaughter said, well, guess we’ll have to look at pinterest. We found this recipe and made it. They loved them and they’re way better than mix. Great with blue berries !!!

Hey there! Adding banana and chocolate chips to the batter would make it quite difficult to achieve the fluffiness (due to the extra mixing required). I’d recommend gently dabbing on the chocolate chips while cooking the pancakes. (You can try caramelising the bananas separately in the pan and serving alongside or on top of the pancakes too!)

If you want fluffy delicious pancakes this recipe is the absolute BEST! ! . My son Vincent and nephew Benjamin are both nine and these fluffy cakes have a a hard time making it to the table. I don’t even need to add more butter before serving! I’ve made this recipe a few times and won’t use anything else! The first time I was a little freaked out by the thick texture. I flipped lightly and was amazed how beautiful and delicious these pancakes came out! We use a small amount of WhistlePig maple syrup and the boys THINK I’m the best cook in the world! Thank you for sharing! We just had dinner for breakfast!

I’ve never felt compelled to leave comments on blog recipes like I have with this one. These no-buttermilk pancakes are FANTASTIC. And the tips were helpful (the nonvoilent flip cracks me up, but it was true)

I’ve made this recipe exactly as is and I’ve also used greek yogurt in place of some of the milk. Both are delicious.

This is honestly the only pancake recipe I use anymore. I’ll be immigrating to France, and watching a lot of French cooking shows to work on the language, and every time I see one of them make pancakes I start to cringe because they start to beat the batter like it’s a meringue, hahahahhaha, I swear I only see Europeans do it, I should watch other non-North American cooks try to make them and see if it’s the same. Anyways, I always leave a comment referring them to this page.